Doctor Jack
by Mira Sol
Summary: Jack awakes from being dead, and the world has gone wrong. The Doctor is wrong. Can Jack and the TARDIS fix this? 10Doctor
1. The Awakening

Title: Doctor Jack

Author: Silwed/Mira Sol

Summary: Jack awakes from being dead, and the world has gone wrong. The Doctor is wrong. Can Jack and the TARDIS fix this?

Genre: 10th Doctor, Alternate Universe, angst, hurt/comfort, slash

Warnings: Memories of torture, slash (male/male pairing…hey, it _is_ Jack), WIP (meaning possible long delays between chapters)

Spoilers: Possible spoilers for the first four seasons of Dr Who (and by first I mean ninth and tenth Doctor), particularly the end of season four. Maybe minor mentions of Torchwood.

Rating: PG13 at the moment

Disclaimer: I do not own Dr. Who, Torchwood, or any of the characters used within the story.

Chapter 1

The Awakening

Jack awoke from an eon's long sleep with a gasp, staring up desperately at the world. A pair of intense eyes were staring back at him, timeless and strangely innocent. Jack knew those eyes.

"Doctor?" he gasped, staring back for a full minute before his brain would process what he was seeing. It couldn't be the doctor, surely not, and not just because it was an unfamiliar body. Never in all his incarnations could Jack conceive of a reason for the Doctor to come back as a small child. And perhaps he wasn't, perhaps it was only circumstances that made him call for the doctor; he remembered coming to life before with the Doctor standing over him in just that way, with just that expression. And yet…the boy had his eyes. They were still staring.

"You were dead," the boy said at last, the high pitched statement of a child. Jack wasn't sure why he still expected differently. But the boy did look familiar, like a ghost left over from a time that never was. A year that never was. Jack had seen the Doctor as a child once, thanks to the Master's whim, just as he had seen him aged. The boy was still staring, waiting for him to speak.

"Yes," Jack answered the child at last, not knowing what else to say. That year was gone, and the Lazarus Machine was destroyed. The Master was dead. There was no way, not even with those eyes, or the way the brown hair spiked from his head in just that same way.

"I know you," the boy said after still more silence. It sounded more like a question than a statement. Jack sat up slowly and the boy stepped back, but not far. He didn't look afraid, merely confused. Jack could empathize. It was always disconcerting to wake up after being dead, no matter how many times it happened. And this time…the void stretched so cold and dark, so forever, that he suspected it had been longer than before. He couldn't remember what had happened; usually coming back to life felt a bit like a seizure; your brain shuts down for a bit then comes back up and time has passed, things have happened, or been un-happened as the case may be. This time felt different. The closest he could remember when it felt like this, he had woken up to see the Doctor staring at him, covered in blood. The Doctor mentioned, flippantly as though he could turn it into a joke, that he had had a bit of trouble finding all the pieces, and he hoped he hadn't missed something vital. The shadows behind his eyes, the blood still coating his hands belied his tone. The boy had no blood on him, but the cold chill of death still clung to Jack, shrouding the past. He wondered how long he had been dead.

"Mum says the dead don't come back to life," the boy said, the puzzled look still on his face, "Time doesn't like it. It's wrong." He didn't say that Jack was wrong. He didn't even look repulsed, but Jack still shuddered slightly.

"Well kid, your mom can't know everything," Jack answered. He considered standing, but decided against it. His limbs still felt heavy, and the cold clung over them. Besides, this way he was more on the kid's level. The boy was staring at him now with a look of astonishment, as though he had said something treasonous or a particularly bad swear word. Of course his mum knew everything.

"My name's Jack," Jack said, grinning slightly at his guppy expression as he offered his hand. The boy smiled in response, his earlier words forgiven as he took the hand and shook it aggressively.

"I'm Jack too!" he exclaimed happily, "Mum says I was named for a great hero who saved the world!" Jack blinked. The boy believed every word he said, yet they didn't feel true; something was very wrong here. He had no proof, nothing but a pair of intense eyes to go on, yet he would swear on everything he was that this was the Doctor. The cold was receding now, giving up more of his memories, and he knew that face. He had to keep reminding himself that the Master was dead, but even that wasn't reassuring. After all, Jack had been dead.

"Ah…and where is your mom?" he asked at last, knowing instinctively he wasn't going to get much more out of the kid. Even when the Doctor had known he was the Doctor, he had had trouble remembering things after the Master de-aged him that young. Jack shuddered again and tried to push that memory back into the abyss where it belonged. The darkness echoed with a child's screams.

Jack the boy didn't seem to notice the minute shudders hidden behind the elder's cocky grin. He took his hand, tugging at him to get up with youthful excitement, chattering happily about the wonder who was his mother, with the occasional word on his father thrown in. Jack let himself be pulled up and led, taking the moment to look around. They were on the shore of a beach. The boy let go of Jack's hand to rush into a small house, shouting for the occupants within, and Jack turned to stare over sparkling waves. A sudden memory crashed over him of blue fading into black, of icy cold filling his lungs, the darkness dragging him down. He gasped, falling to his knees until it passed, and he was on the shore again, beneath the bright sun. Had he drowned? How long had he lain beneath the waves before he was washed up on the shore? Then the boy was skipping back, looking down from the porch with concern.

"Are you alright?" he asked, "You aren't going to be dead again are you?" And now, at last, he looked a bit scared. Jack pulled himself up and gave the boy a reassuring smile.

"I can't die," he said, and the boy brightened a bit.

"I don't like it when people die," he said happily, "I was afraid…" and then he suddenly looked troubled again, confused, his eyes far too old on his young face, "I was afraid you wouldn't come back this time." Jack blinked. But the boy smiled again, his ancient eyes so innocent it was obvious he didn't really remember anything. The feeling of wrongness returned to Jack, infecting the perfect serenity like a cancer. "Mum isn't here," the boy continued after a moment, "She went shopping and she needed Dad to fly. Grandma is here though. Do you want to come meet her?"

"Of course," Jack answered, bracing himself for any surprise he could think of as he walked up the steps. The boy grabbed his hand again, pulling him into the house.

"Grandma!" he shouted, making Jack wince at the pitch he achieved; quite aside from the pain to his eardrums it was far too close to the screams in the abyss for comfort. "There is a dead man here, who says he can't die, and guess what?! He's Jack too!" And he pulled Jack into a small kitchen where a woman was busy making a sandwich. Jack didn't know what he was expecting, someone associated with the Master perhaps. But he didn't recognize the woman, not really, though there was something familiar about her. If he had met her, it was many years ago and only briefly. She didn't seem to know him either, but there was an odd expression on her face as she stared at him.

"It figures," she muttered at last, "He promises, absolutely promises, empty beaches and yet here you are, second person to turn up! And what are you then, you are human aren't you? Not one of those space men?"

"No, ma'am," he answered, giving her one of his most winning smiles, "Jack Harkness is my name. I came for the empty beaches myself. Of course, had I known such a beautiful lady lived up here, I'd have come down sooner."

"Eh, you do lay it on thick," she scolded, but she looked pleased. After that she offered him tea while little Jack took the offered sandwich, occasionally trying to explain about how he found Jack to which his grandmother only told him not to talk with his mouth full. Jack continued to smile and charm while inwardly trying to figure out why he felt he should know her. It felt surreal, waking from the dead on a beach only to be having tea with a child Doctor and his grandmother. She was just telling him how her son-in-law set up this holiday for her, when Jack heard a very familiar whooshing sound.

"They're here, they're here!" boy Jack exclaimed excitedly, running out the meet them. Jack followed more slowly, the grandmother trying to hold him back at every step with nervous words. She didn't seem to think Jack should see what was happening, but Jack managed to evade her hands and step out on the porch just as the TARDIS solidified beside the steps. The boy was already at the door, tugging it open with no trouble or fumbling for keys. A second later he emerged again, holding a grocery bag. His parents followed, laden down with more bags and chatting happily, until their eyes alighted upon Jack. They both froze for a moment, caught in an expression of utter shock. The father got over it first, dropping his packages onto the porch as he leaped up to grab Jack's hand, pulling him into a hug, calling Jack's name.

"Doctor," Jack said, giving him a quick hug back before looking over his shoulder to where his wife still stood, her face white with shock, "Hello Rose."

Author's Note: This will not be a happy Dr/Rose family fic, no matter what it may look like at first.


	2. Questions

Chapter 2

"You're not the Doctor." Jack stared hard at the man before him, a grim expression upon his face. He looked like the Doctor, he even had his eyes. But Jack had travelled in the TARDIS; he had been a companion once; he had lived for hundreds of years, weaving paths with the Doctor through time. And no matter if this man had the Doctor's face, or even his eyes, the sense was off. The man before him gave him a bemused grin.

"That's what Rose says," he answered, and if he were anyone else he might have sounded bitter. And there was pain, hidden behind years of experience in his smile. Jack eyed him warily. This was wrong. Rose was supposed to be locked away in another dimension with this man who was not the Doctor but was. Unless Jack had somehow, inexplicably, managed to cross universes, then this meeting shouldn't be possible. The not Doctor held out his hand. "John Alonso Tyler," he said, an odd quirk to his lips. At Jack's own look, he added, "She wouldn't let me call Jack Alonso, and she didn't see the point of changing her name when it wasn't real."

"John," Jack said, taking the others hand, feeling strange to grasp the look-a-like's hand without feeling the aura of time, "How did 'Jack' come to be like this?" Their hands stayed connected a moment longer, not shaking or even squeezing, before John pulled his away. Suddenly he seemed to need to be busy. Jack had seen him like this often, restlessly moving about the TARDIS, setting coordinates or fixing panels while he revealed the secrets of the universe, or at least the bits and pieces in his relevant to the situation. Now, far from any sort of control panel, he set about putting away the groceries while simultaneously setting up places for tea.

"Well," he said, "Mind you, I wasn't there when it happened, but she did tell me about it, well, I say I wasn't there, really I wasn't awake, so I can hardly know, but…"

"Doctor!" Jack cried, and then, belatedly he corrected himself with, "John."

"She didn't know what she was doing," he said, his movements momentarily frozen, focused upon Jack, "He was dying and she didn't want to lose him."

"What do you mean 'she didn't know what she was doing'?" Jack demanded, "What did Rose do? And why couldn't he regenerate?" Doctor John hesitated to answer, seeming caught. It wasn't often Jack saw him speechless when it came to explaining things; the Doctor, any Doctor, loved to explain even when no one in the room understood a word he was saying. When the silence was finally broken, it wasn't by Jack or John.

"He would have changed," Rose said suddenly from the doorway. She had fled with little Jack after only a quick greeting, but she was back now. Little Jack was nowhere to be seen. "I already watched him change once, I didn't want to lose him that way again."

"He's still the Doctor, no matter what he looks like," Jack answered, his eyes narrowed.

"And what he sounds like?" she demanded, "And acts like? And what about when the regenerations run out? He didn't need to die, not this time."

"Rose," Jack said, staring at her hard. Doctor John was busy about the kitchen again, his movements filled with energy, his eyes turning to look every which way but towards them. "What did you do?"

"I tried to fix him," she answered simply, "With the sonic screwdriver. I tried to heal him while he was changing, before he could change. And he didn't change, but he didn't heal quite how we expected, either."

"That's it?" Jack demanded, "The sonic screwdriver did that?" Rose shrugged her shoulders helplessly, turning towards John for an explanation, one he didn't have to give.

"Right, so…" John said, finishing setting the plates with a flourish just as the teapot began to whistle, "How about a cup of tea?" Before Jack could say anything more, little Jack walked back into the room, dragging his grandmother with him. Of course there were still a hundred things left unexplained, starting with why Rose and the not Doctor were here in the first place, and why Rose was in any position to be trying to heal the Doctor during a regeneration. But Jack felt at a loss to ask with the Doctor sitting in Rose's lap, telling her all about finding Jack and what happened on his walk just now and arguing whether or not he should get a biscuit. It was wrong, but it seemed equally wrong to destroy the child's innocence by tearing his simple world apart. So Jack let the surreal domesticity sweep over him and accepted his second cup of tea.

Later, as the sun set over the water and the household turned quiet, he stepped out on the porch alone and stared forlornly over the waves. It wasn't a comfortable place for him to be; he still got a dark ache in his lungs just staring over the vast expanse of water, an ache he hoped to get over quickly. After all, if he developed a phobia for every way he had died, he'd be afraid to do just about anything by then. And he didn't remember drowning, not really, just a sense of dark and icy cold. Nor could he remember what came before death, the reason behind it. While he stood there, in the quiet chill of the evening with the foreboding ocean swelling before him, he felt the comforting welcome of a friend. He turned away from the water and looked at the TARDIS.

No matter how wrong the Doctor was, how wrong this situation was, she still felt perfectly normal. It was easy to forget she was there, sometimes, that she was more than a way of getting from point A to point B. Her touch was subtle, easing in behind the scenes, yet suddenly you can talk to people you couldn't understand before, and find rooms inside her four walls that seem made just for you. And when she was displeased, her tantrums could disrupt your dreams, lead you astray within her corridors, play on little annoyances like a gnat buzzing in your ear. Jack had learned early it was best to be on good terms. She called to him now.

He still had his key, a miracle when he thought about it. In fact, it occurred to him that he was lucky he hadn't washed ashore naked. It wouldn't be the first time his death had led to the loss of his clothes, and if he had been in the ocean for as long as it felt like, surely his clothes should have long since deteriorated away. A memory came then, a brief conversation after a series of rather unfortunate incidents that led to his shirt being full of holes.

"Made from the thread of a capara from Clyptho," the Doctor said in an exited manner, "High temperatures, horrid climate; regular clothes would be destroyed within a week." Had he gotten clothes from there? They looked like regular, Earth design yet there wasn't so much as a hole on them. Still, he couldn't remember. Deciding to ignore that mystery for the moment, he took his key and stepped into the TARDIS.

There was nothing drastically or obviously changed about her. No tell-tell signs of the barbaric monstrosity that created the paradox machine, no drastic change in color scheme. But something was wrong.

It wasn't with her, exactly. But she was upset, unhappy, beseeching for Jack to set it right. Jack found himself reaching out to stroke her side, much as he had seen the Doctor do a million times before. Then he walked around to look at her settings, suddenly determined to know exactly where he was.

It was Earth, as far as he could tell; Earth's coordinates were familiar and the TARDIS tended to fall upon them like a billiard ball rolling into a well worn groove. The timeline was a different matter to detect, the TARDIS was notably temperamental when it came to time. She had a tendency to go where they needed to go, rather than where they wanted. The setting seemed almost double set, one timeline on top of the other. He was sure the Doctor would have understood, but he sure didn't. It looked almost as though it was set for the distant, prehistoric past and a few centuries past the 21st at the same time. He gave it up.

"What is going on here?" he whispered, looking over the instruments without touching them, "What happened to the Doctor?" As though summoned, the door to the TARDIS suddenly flew open and the boy ran in.

"Hello, Jack, I just knew you were here!" he cried by way of greeting, "She likes you, you know."

"Does she?" Jack asked, absently touching the panel again though most of his attention was on the Doctor. He looked so innocent it was hard to say how much he knew of what had happened. Did he even know who he was? Or did he think he really was just a boy named Jack, son to Rose and John Tyler? It wouldn't be the first time he had lost his memory, through alien machinery, head wounds, or once because of the TARDIS herself had taken the memory away. Jack was never certain whether he was thankful to her for that, or jealous that he couldn't forget that memory as well. For one, brief moment he was lost in the abyss with the screaming, before that thought was slowly, gently eased away, and it was only little Jack's high pitched chatter.

"Are you alright?" he was saying, "You look a bit white there. I know she can be odd, but she does like you, really."

"What's not to love," Jack answered reflexively, his eyes studying the child. The boy's eyes were old, old in ways the clone's weren't despite the weight of ancient memories shared between them. They were also innocent, both of them, an odd thought when said about the elder. The boy studied him in return, a look of deep concentration upon his face.

"Mum and dad knows you," he said after a moment, "Dad said the TARDIS brought you back when you died and she wasn't supposed to."

"No," he agreed, deciding it better not to explain, not about the woman he called mother or the vortex. He almost felt it wasn't his place, even knowing those two had no real claim to call him their son. Maybe because John was still the Doctor, even though he wasn't. And Rose always did seem to have a bigger hold on the Doctor than he could manage. Perhaps there was some jealousy there too.

"Well, I'm glad you aren't dead," the boy declared firmly, after another long bout of studying him, and Jack couldn't help but grin in response.

"I'm glad too," he answered, and he was, most days. Except when he wasn't. The boy came closer, running his small hands over the panel, before he came to a stop next to Jack.

"Have you come to take me away?" the boy asked suddenly, "Are we going home now, Jack?" Jack froze for a moment before leaning down to look the Doctor in the eye.

"Where is home?" he asked. The boy looked puzzled for a moment, then blinked and smiled, the guileless smile of the very young.

"On the beach of course," he said, "You saw it! Mum and dad went shopping and dad said he'd bring back chips, only mum says they aren't healthy." Jack blinked his eyes and straightened up slowly. And the boy turned and ran out the door, back to his family. Jack followed slowly.

He slept on the TARDIS that night.


End file.
